Afrikaans poet Ingrid Jonker existed, in the words of Breyten Breytenbach, in the schism of “living in a social hell in a physical paradise.” A life of romantic compromise and socio-political injustice became unbearable, culminating in her suicide in 1965, aged 31. Her relentless inner dialogue expressed with searing intimacy and imagination the impasse of her life, her relationships and her country, thus ensuring her literary stature _ as did Nelson Mandela’s tribute to her in 1994 when opening South Africa’s first democratic parliament. Interviews with those who knew her and various literary figures provide insight into this artist, whose life, tragically and courageously, came to symbolise the pain of her native land.